


Alm Calls Tatiana "Mom" and Dies

by PinkHydrangea



Category: Fire Emblem Echoes: Mou Hitori no Eiyuu Ou | Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia
Genre: Mother-Son Relationship, let Alm have a momther, tatiana is everyone's mom tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2017-08-07
Packaged: 2018-12-12 11:37:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11736276
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PinkHydrangea/pseuds/PinkHydrangea
Summary: It's hard for Alm to not see someone so caring and kind as a maternal figure, especially when he's never had one before.





	Alm Calls Tatiana "Mom" and Dies

**Author's Note:**

> i keep embarrassing you Alm iM SORRY but seriously, Tatiana and Alm having a mother/son relationship is exceedingly important to me, let Alm have a mom??? also by an extension of this, Zeke is technically Alm's dad, ALM-TATIANA-ZEKE PSUDEO-FAMILY IS IMPORTANT TO ME AND IT'S ALSO HILARIOUS

Alm’s arm is bleeding, and it’s bleeding pretty badly. Silque has her hands full, though, fretting over Luthier and Clive, and the other healers are preoccupied as well. He can’t afford to bother them while they’re busy, so he sees what he can do on his own with his limited medical knowledge.

The wound is oozing something brown alongside all the blood, and it makes him feel like hurling, in all honesty. It’s a wound from an arcanist’s spell, and Alm doesn’t even want to _know_ what he got hit with. He prods at the inflamed area carefully, immediately drawing back and wincing when it throbs painfully. It doesn’t seem like a poison, he muses, because a poison would burn, right? Or he’d feel sick? Or he’d already be dead, even.

“Are you okay over here?”

The voice is sweet, but unfamiliar, and Alm has to look over his shoulder to see who it is that’s speaking to him. It’s the woman from the dungeons—Tatiana, is it?—and his shoulders relax.

“Oh, Tatiana. I’m, uh… I’m fine.”

Tatiana is wearing new clothes, he notices, as she kneels down next to him. Her old ones had been a tattered and grimy blouse and skirt, and she’s now wearing a soft red dress, obviously loaned by Clair. Her hair is pulled back with a white ribbon, and Alm is struck by how sweet-looking and pretty she is, not cowering or fearing for her life on the floor of a musty old dungeon.

Tatiana holds out her hand, and Alm stares at it. She waves it insistently, then nods at his arm. “Your wound.”

He covers it up, but suddenly notices that it’s oozing faster. “It’s nothing.”

“I’m a cleric,” she says. “I don’t have my staff, but I can still help a little without it.”

“I, uh-” Alm swallows, looking for a reason to deny her help, but finds that he doesn’t have one. She’s Rigelian, sure, but she’s got big, kind eyes and a gentle smile, and despite all the horror stories he’s heard of her people while growing up (“Warlike savages, all of them!”), she doesn’t seem to have a violent or malicious bone in her body. “It’s oozing pretty bad. I mean, you just got clean…”

Tatiana seems to take this as an invite and grabs his arm gently. “Oh, I’ve seen worse than this.” She hums while examining his arm, tilting her head to the right, then to the left. Alm wonders if she’s even actually doing anything, or if she’s just trying to look smart, and then she says: “Poison.”

He jumps and jerks his arm in her grip. “Wh-what?!”

“This is a common spell around here,” she says, and she gets up, heading somewhere in the manor. “Wait just a moment.”

Alm’s heart pumps rapidly and he grips his arm, watching in horror as the brown stuff continues to pour out, more and more rapidly. His head is starting to feel light. He’s woozy. “Poison!? T-Tatiana, wait!”

She comes back a few minutes later with a bucket, and Alm is relieved when it looks like there isn’t much but water inside of it. Well, he guesses it looks a little bit cloudy when she sets it down next to him, but other than that, it looks harmless.

“This’ll sting,” Tatiana says as she grabs his arm, and Alm sputters in mild panic before yelling as she dunks it into the bucket.

“Holy Mila!” he yells. His arm doesn’t so much “sting,” but feels like someone has set it ablaze, and he wheezes. He tries yanking it out on instinct, but Tatiana squeezes him and pushes more insistently into the bucket.

“Don’t worry, it’s working.” She nods into the water, and Alm opens up his screwed-up eyes and peers into the bucket.

The brown stuff is pouring out, but frothing and dissolving into white, leaving only the blood. His arm hurts like all hell, but it’s no longer from the poison; just from the water on his open arm.

“It’s a poison that spreads fast, but it’s easily fixed with some saltwater.” Tatiana lets go of his arm.

He pulls it out of the bucket, amazed at the fix. He’s still bleeding, sure, but no poison! “Saltwater, huh? That’s why it stung so bad? Yikes! You could’ve warned a guy, you know?”

She gives a sheepish smile and a nervous laugh. “I’m sorry. You were starting to look pale, so there wasn’t really much time to explain. Now, let’s dry you off.”

There’s a towel in her lap that he didn’t notice before, and he sits still while she rubs all the water away. The bleeding actually isn’t that bad, now that the poison is gone, and only a few splotches of red show up on the cloth as she rubs. She hums a little, some song that Alm assumes is Rigelian, and claps her hands together when finished.

“All clean!” she chirps. “Now, just a little touch of magic, aaaaaaand-!”

Tatiana rests her hand on his forearm, right at the beginning of the wound, and smooths it over in a single sweep. The feeling that washes over is cold, refreshingly so, like the lotion Grandfather used to smooth on his sunburns as a kid. When she gets to the end of the wound, she takes her hand away. The skin there is now unblemished, as though it hadn’t been on the verge of rotting a minute before.

Alm lifts it to examine it, prodding the flesh in amazement. It tingles, feels a little numb, but otherwise is great. “Wow. You’re really good at this!”

Tatiana laughs nervously, rubbing the back of her head. “Oh, well, I’m kinda an airhead, and a little useless, so healing is really the only thing I’m good at… And ever since I met Zeke, I’ve had a lot more chances to get even better, since he’s always out being gallant and helping people.”

Alm smiles and holds a hand out to her, and she stares at it in bewilderment for a moment before grinning back. He’d intended for her to shake his hand, but she holds it in both of hers instead, sweetly rubbing her thumbs over it, and Alm instantly regrets ever thinking of her people as savages.

* * *

“Alm?”

Tatiana pushes the flap of the tent aside and peers in. It’s late, and he’s poring over papers that he barely understands at Clive’s behest. They need to be organized, and it’s taking him much longer than he ever wanted it to. It’s probably the middle of the night, but he isn’t really sure. He hasn’t been outside the tent in hours, honestly, and his head blurs and burns when he finally looks up from the reports. He’s surprised to see her awake at such an hour—Zeke had left a while before to go to sleep, after all.

When she slips in, standing hesitantly at the entrance, he notices that she probably was in bed. Her hair is braided neatly down her back, though a few stray hairs that could only have come from sleeping are sticking up, and she’s wearing a long night dress and a gray sweater. She fidgets a little, readjusting her grip on a tray in her hands, and he nods to her.

“Hey, come on in. Something the matter?”

She moves forward a little, looking up from her tray to him, then back to her tray. “Oh, well, I couldn’t sleep, and I knew you were still working, so…” She lifts it sheepishly. “I made something.”

Sitting atop the tray is a plate of bread, crusted with baked cheese, a kettle that steams in the cold air, and a mug. He hasn’t eaten in a little while, so he smiles and holds out his hands.

“Thank you. I appreciate it.” He begins eating immediately, reading over the same line on a paper for the seventh time. The bread is cold, but the drink that Tatiana pours looks warm, sending up puffs of steam as it sets.

“This is from my own stash,” she says playfully as she sets the mug in front of him. “It’s a hot chocolate mix from a town we passed by a couple weeks ago. It’s tasty, so have some.”

“Are you sure that’s fine?” Luxuries are hard to come by, after all. He doesn’t want Tatiana to waste what she has on him.

“Oh, please, things taste much better after you’ve shared them with someone else. I’d feel selfish if I hoarded it all to myself. Besides, you look ready to freeze, honey.”

The chill has been getting to him, and the drink warms him up instantly when he sips at it. It scalds his tongue, but the rich chocolate taste has him going back for more instantly. He tastes a hint of cinnamon, a bit of cream, and wonders when the last time he had something so delicious was.

Tatiana reaches for the papers suddenly. “Let me help you with these. They need to be organized by date and urgency, right?”

“Er, yeah.” He watches, still sipping and munching, as Tatiana settles down next to him and starts stacking the papers. “You sure that you-?”

“I’m not good at a lot of things, but I know how to organize reports.” She holds two in her hands, looks between them, and then slips them underneath a larger stack. “Zeke had to do these all the time, because Jerome would just make him do them when he didn’t want to. He’d stay up all night and not get any sleep until they were all done, so I insisted he show me how to help.”

“You and Zeke are pretty close, aren’t you?” Alm asks, and he instantly regrets it when she turns to him with sparkling eyes.

“Of course! Isn’t he just the best? He’s so nice and smart, and we take really good care of each other. I’m so lucky that someone like him decided to look my way, you know?”

It’s a tired, absent-minded comment, what he says next. “I think Zeke’s lucky that _you_ looked _his_ way, to be honest.”

Tatiana blushes and furiously studies the paper in her hand, and Alm wonders if he’s stepped over some sort of line, and if Zeke is going to come and kick his ass later.

“Oh, you’re such a sweet boy,” she says a bit later. “But I’m not really anything special. I don’t know why Zeke has stuck around.”

“You’re nice,” Alm tells her. He swirls the chocolate drink around his mug. “And you took care of him when he was down, right? He tells me you helped get him out of prison when he was accused of being a spy. And you’ve always taken good care of him. Not many people would do that for some amnesiac stranger, you know?”

She blushes a little more and hides her face in her hands. “Stop it! You’re making me blush.”

Alm finishes the drink, the last of the cheese bread, and he and Tatiana complete the organizing in silence.

* * *

Rigel is getting colder and colder as the winter beats down on them, and everyone is constantly shuddering. They’re only ever warm in the heat of battle, and outside of that, everyone is as cold as an icicle. The wood they can find for fire is scarce as they travel through a rocky valley, and soldiers struggle to keep from getting frostbite on their limbs.

Alm shudders, huddled up between Python and Forsyth, and wraps his arms around himself. Python is asleep, head on Alm’s shoulder, and doesn’t even move as Alm shudders, teeth chattering. Forsyth is writing something in a journal, but he can see how stiff his fingers are as he tries to move his pen over the paper.

“Is Python still alive?” he asks Forsyth.

The soldier looks over at Python, crinkles his nose, and goes back to his journal. “Eh.”

“Okay.”

Faye comes by with a large blanket a few minutes later, hands it to Alm, who in turns tries to lay it over all three of them. His limbs are so cold that they tingle and feel as though pins are pricking into him whenever he moves, and he mumbles and groans. He knows that he said the Rigelian cold was familiar when they first crossed the border, but it’s still _bad,_ and he can’t even imagine how his friends are doing.

“Oh, there you are!”

Tatiana seems to be the only one not entirely phased by the freezing cold, and that could have something to do with the fact that she’s Rigelian through-and-through, or perhaps with the fact that Zeke is constantly buying her warmer and warmer clothing whenever they pass through a town. Probably both.

There’s a bundle of things piled in her arms, a large bag slung over her shoulder, and she hums a cheery tune as she kneels down in front of Alm, Forsyth, and Python. She carefully sets her pile of things down, and Alm notices that it’s all garments, knitted and sewn with great care.

“Where’d you get these?” he asks.

She doesn’t reply right away, but instead pulls a blue scarf from the pile and wraps it around his neck. The yarn is incredibly soft, and he can’t help but shut his eyes in enjoyment as it rubs against his skin. It’s a long thing, and she has to wrap it around a few times before finally tying it in a light knot, securing it in place.

“Hands please,” she says, and she then pushes a pair of soft black mittens on his hands when he presents them to her obediently. The lack of cold nipping at his fingers is a relief, and Alm sighs and tries to wiggle feeling back into them.

Tatiana offers the same clothing to Forsyth, and he smiles and bends his head to allow her to wrap a handsome brown scarf around him. “There you are!”

“My thanks, Miss Tatiana,” he says, and then he turns to Python. “He might be dead, so don’t worry about him.”

“Oh my.” Tatiana inches over towards Python, hums with a finger on her chin, and then pries open his eye with two fingers. He jerks back suddenly, taking in a deep breath as he somewhat wakes up, and glares at her.

“Go away,” he mumbles.

“He’s okay,” Tatiana says, and she wordlessly drapes a scarf on him as well. “You poor things, none of you are equipped to deal with a Rigelian winter.”

“We really aren’t,” Alm mumbles. The feeling is starting to come back into his fingers, just a smidge, and he leans into his new scarf. “Even Zeke seems to be having a hard time.”

“Mmm, he isn’t Rigelian either,” she relents to say. “He’s got warmer clothes than all of you, though, so he’s holding up better than most.”

“Right.” He lifts the ends of the scarf up in his hands and stares at it, then at his new mittens. “Where’d you get these?”

There’s a smoldering fire in the clearing in front of them, and Tatiana picks up a stick and prods at it, turning the smoldering embers over. Out of the bag slung over her shoulder, she pulls out some kindling, and tries using it to bring the flames back to life. However, without solid firewood, there’s little she or anyone can do.

“I made them,” she says. “Or, they were given to me.”

The embers glow a little brighter, and he and Forsyth inch a little closer to it. Python grumbles, but has fallen back asleep.

“Who gave them to you?” Forsyth asks.

“Well, sometimes I go into nearby towns and villages to heal the people there,” she explains. “A lot of people are sick right now, because it’s so cold, so an experienced cleric like myself is a welcome sight. And no one knows I’m with the Deliverance, so I’m usually greeted pretty warmly.”

It makes sense, Alm supposed: No one would expect a sweet Rigelian cleric to be on the enemy’s side, and he’s grateful for Tatiana’s ability to blend in with the locals wherever they travel.

“Anyway, instead of money, I always ask for clothes or yarn or other supplies as payment,” Tatiana says. “I’ve been spending most of my time knitting away at all these for everyone. It’s really the least I can do.”

“You’re a godsend, Miss Tatiana,” Forsyth says. “We take what blessings we can in these harsh times, correct?”

“Just so,” she agrees, and she then smiles at Alm. “You just let me know if you need anything else made, Alm. Sewing and knitting are some of my better skills, so I can keep you warm.”

* * *

They’re camped out outside a valley for a couple of weeks, trying to figure out how to approach the next fort properly. It’s heavily fortified with archers and witches, and Alm spends a lot of his time in strategy meetings with his generals. They discuss one plan, then another, and then another and another and another, until Alm is ready to just kill himself and be done with it.

The solace in all of this is that at the end of every day, Tatiana has a reassuring rub on the head, a hot meal, and a healing smile to offer him. She works tirelessly around the camp, healing, cleaning, cooking, and he knows that she runs herself ragged. It’s a desire to prove that she’s useful, he knows, and Alm can relate to that. As the only one in camp with no battle experience, she works ten times harder to prove her use than almost anyone else.

And yet, she’s always finding time to pat his cheek and tell him, “You work so hard, Alm! Come take a rest for a bit,” or “Here’s something to drink,” or “Did my Zeke beat on you and your friends too hard during practice today? I’ll have a talk with him, don’t worry.”

The last one kind of stings at his pride, but she has no bad intentions, so he doesn’t let it bother him.

In any case, Alm really wants to do something for Tatiana, but he’s not sure what. He could buy her a treat from the nearby town, or have her staff repaired, or order Zeke to take a day off, but Alm has never really given a present to a woman before. He’s given presents to Faye, sure, but Faye is a _girl._ Tatiana, even if only a couple years older than Faye, is definitely a woman.

“You look very focused,” Zeke says during a strategy meeting that consists of only the two of them. They’re just wrapping up, putting away the war board and books and pens.

“Yeah.” He rests his head in his hand and fiddles with a wooden figure of an archer, tilting it back and forth under a finger.

The man hesitates for a moment, shifting his grip on the pommel of his saber, then asks with no small amount of awkwardness, “Do you… need someone to speak with?”

“You don’t have to listen to my problems just because you feel obligated,” Alm mutters, then pauses. He lifts his head out of his palm and then looks at Zeke. “Actually, you can help me.”

“I’m at your service, my lord.”

“How many times have I asked you to not call me that?”

“Alm,” Zeke remedies. “How can I help?”

“Well, Tatiana’s always doing nice things for me, so I wanted to do something nice for her. Buy her something, you know? Except, well, I’ve never really given a present to a woman before, and I don’t know what Tatiana likes or needs.” He tilts his head towards the general. “But you know.”

His general hums, rubs at his jaw, and looks to the ground. “Something Tatiana likes or needs… I see.” Zeke glances down at Alm, looks away, and then leans over towards him, as though someone is in the tent who will eavesdrop on them. “Listen, Tatiana and I snuck into town the other night.”

Alm is irked and snaps his head towards the general to glare. “So that’s where you were!” He pauses. “Why’d you sneak into town?

Zeke gives him a look that’s slightly guilty, maybe embarrassed. “Well… Luthier and Delthea pitched their tent rather close to ours.”

Alm doesn’t understand and stares blankly.

“We went into town to, ah, find somewhere private.”

Alm stares a little more.

Zeke now appears amused. “Do you really want to be privy to all the details of my _intimate_ life with my lover, Alm?”

He heats up suddenly, embarrassed that he didn’t catch onto the strong implication before. He clears his throat and stares back at the wooden figure. “No. Ignorance is bliss.”

Zeke smiles, then continues. “That’s beside the point. When we went, there was a dress that Tatiana wanted, but didn’t have enough money to buy. I offered to purchase it for her, but she wouldn’t let me.”

“A dress?” Alm echoes.

“Yes. I was intending to go back and buy it for her without her knowing, but if you wanted to do something kind for her, this could be it. She needs a new one anyway, after she was bled all over during that last ambush. She couldn’t get the stains out.”

“Something she wants and needs,” Alm says. “That’s perfect. Can you write down the name of the shop and tell me what the dress looks like?”

He goes into town the next day during a lull in the chores around camp, and he brings Faye and Kliff with him. He brings Faye just because, well, she’s Faye, and she likes going places with him, and he figures having her opinion is good. Kliff tags along because he’s heard about a good bookstore, and he wanders away from Alm and Faye pretty early on in the trip.

“I think this is the one the general was talking about,” she says when they walk into the store. She holds the garment in her hands, pulling the skirt, and nods. “Cute and practical. Looks like the seamwork is good, too. And this kind of fabric doesn’t hold onto stains, so if she gets bled on again, it’s got a better chance of coming out.”

“Being a healer must be exhausting,” Alm says. “Imagine someone just bleeding on you for hours and hours. Tatiana must have a hard job. I’m shocked at how she can smile through stuff like that.”

Faye shudders, trailing behind him as he takes the garment to the counter. “I’m really glad I decided to be a pegasus knight. I was leaning towards being a cleric like Silque for a little while, but I don’t know if I could keep steady while patching up you or Kliff, or any of our friends.”

The shop attendants pack the dress into a nice box, and Alm pays an uncomfortably large amount of money for it. He wonders if a dress is really enough to thank Tatiana for everything that she does, even if it’s cost him half-a-month’s salary.

The look on her face is shocked as Alm hands the box over, and she tries to shove it back into his hands.

“Oh my goodness, I couldn’t possibly accept such a nice gift,” she protests.

“Zeke said you needed some new clothes,” Alm insists, and he pushes it into her arms. “You should go try it on.”

“Are you certain?” she asks. “You could’ve bought yourself something nice with that kind of money. You can still take this back.”

“Try it on,” he says again. “I wanna see how it looks.”

She hesitantly retreats into her tent, and Alm waits for a few minutes for her to come back out. With the amount of money he spent on it, he really hopes it fits her and is comfortable, and that it’ll last her for a while—as long as a healer’s clothes last during a war campaign, that is.

Tatiana comes back out of the tent almost nervously, and she smooths the brown skirt down with fidgeting hands. The top of the dress is a soft cream color, tied with a bow at the neck, and she wears a black sweater over it to keep warm against the blowing winter winds. Her hair is tied up, and as her anxiety subsides, she appears delighted with her new outfit.

“It looks really good on you,” Alm says. “It fits well?”

“Like a glove,” she replies, then smiles. “Thank you. I did need a new dress, but I just didn’t want to buy myself such a nice one.”

“It’s the least I can do for you,” he says, and he steps forward to push a lock of hair out of her face. “You’re always doing nice things for me, so I wanted to do something nice in return.”

She appears shocked for a moment, and then bursts into laughter. “Sweet boy, you don’t have to pay me back! I’m just doing my job. I’m not really that tough, so healing everyone and giving the camp a bit of a domestic touch is all I can do.”

“Well, your ‘domestic touch,’ as you call it, is sorely needed around here. Everyone appreciates it. If you ever need anything, you let me know, okay?” Alm leans in a little and lowers his voice. “And if anyone is rude to you because you’re Rigelian, you let me know that, too. I know some people say things.”

Her smile falters. She scratches at her neck in a nervous tic. “It’s okay. It doesn’t bother me.”

“It’s not okay. Nobody says anything bad about you, not in my army.”

Tatiana pats his cheek, her hand soft and warm even in the winter air, and smiles. “You’re so nice to me, Alm. Thank you.”

He opens his mouth to reply, but she sees something over his shoulder, her smile brightens, and she flits away. When Alm turns, he sees Zeke has passed by behind them, and Tatiana is most certainly showing him her new dress, based on the way she holds her skirts and chatters excitedly. He holds her hand above her while she spins, sending the skirts fluttering, and Alm thinks it’s a rather sweet sight.

Gray walks up next to him, puts his hands on his hips while he watches the lovers, and then nods his head. “Well, he’s definitely stripping her out of that tonight.”

Alm puts his hands over his ears and walks away.

* * *

“You holding up, Alm?”

Rain and hail pound against the tent, and Alm takes in a shuddering breath after finishing a coughing fit. His entire body is hot, aches, and his throat is full of phlegm and other gunk that he doesn’t even want to consider. He’s just grateful that it’s not freezing cold, and that it’s raining instead of snowing, even if the hail that falls from the sky leaves welts on everyone’s flesh.

Tatiana runs her fingers over his forehead, pulling away strands of sweaty hair, and rests a damp cloth on his skin. It’s cool and soothes his fever, and he nods weakly.

“I’m fine,” he says a little hoarsely. “Thanks for helping me.”

She takes another cloth, dips it in her basin, and wrings it out before gently patting at his collarbones with it. “No problem. Fevers and sicknesses like this are my speciality. I’ll have you feeling better in no time.”

The fever had come on suddenly, brought along by the storms and fog, and Alm has now been confined to his tent for the past two days. Strategy meetings carry on without him, with Forsyth standing outside his tent flap and relaying the outcomes and decisions after every one, and Alm feels incredibly guilty. Him, the commander of the army, stuck in his tent with a fever while all his soldiers keep working? Keep planning and trying and fighting?

“I’m surprised you’ve only caught this fever now,” Tatiana says, and she puts the cloth back against the basin. “All your friends have been to see me already. Zofians really aren’t built for strong cold like this, are they?”

Alm laughs weakly. “Mila not only keeps the land fertile, but she also makes the winters manageable. Hell, she probably only gives them to us for the sake of giving the kids snow to play in. They’re nothing like this.”

“And look where being spoiled like that has gotten you now,” Tatiana chides teasingly, and she hums as she sets her medicine chest on her lap. “Good thing Rigelians like us have natural resistance to cold, right?”

Alm freezes, blinking at the quivering ceiling of the tent, and then turns his head to regard Tatiana. “What?”

She digs around her supplies. “You know, it’s kinda just an evolutionary thing. Rigelians are resistant to cold.”

“You said ‘us,’” Alm says, and then wonders if he’s just really, really tired, and he only imagined that. Perhaps his recent doubts, suspicions, his insecurities, have all warped together to make him hear something not actually said.

Tatiana looks up and nods. “Yes. Like us. Rigelians.”

His heart thumps a little faster, and he shakes his head. “I’m not Rigelian.”

 _But aren’t you?_ a little voice in the corner of his brain asks. _You know by now, Alm._

He shoves the voice away and swallows.

Alm knows that he’s a Zofian. He is a Zofian, the grandson of a Zofian general.

Zofian. Zofian. Not Rigelian.

Tatiana furrows her brow. “No, you’re a Rigelian. Just like me. Right?”

Weakly, Alm shakes his head again, and the wet cloth falls away.

She picks it up and replaces it, and her expression is worried as she strokes his head. “Don’t you see it? We look alike, just a little.”

“Like how?” he mumbles.

“The shape of our eyes,” she starts, “and the shape of our noses. See, it’s got this slope here.” She drags a finger down the bridge of his nose for emphasis. “And you’ve got that resistance to the cold that all Rigelians have. And your voice, and-”

“Stop,” he mutters, and he turns his head away from her. Alm swallows, and then looks back at Tatiana. When he looks closely at her, he definitely does see the curve of his eye in hers, the positioning of her cheekbones, and things like that.

“I’m sorry,” she says softly, and she strokes the back of her fingers over his cheek. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. You were raised in Zofia, after all. Please, forgive me.”

“It’s okay,” Alm says quietly, and then he bursts into another coughing fit. Tatiana hurriedly rummages through her medicine chest.

Alm is a Zofian. That has to be true.

* * *

Alm has seen Tatiana cry before, a handful of times. It’s usually over kind of trivial things, though, like bumping her head a little hard, or if Zeke gets a scratch too many during a fight, or if she accidentally burns a meal and wastes important army provisions. Even in those cases, they’re fleeting, quiet tears. Sometimes they don’t even fall, and her eyes just shine a little in a way that indicates that she _could_ burst into actual tears at any moment.

This, however, what she’s doing as she leans against him, is weeping.

“It’s okay,” Alm tries to reassure, and he grabs her forearms as she hunches against him. “Tatiana, it’s okay.”

“I don’t want him to go,” she sobs.

Alm wonders how he got into this situation. All he’d done was walk into the mess tent, looking for a knife to peel a peach with, he’d asked Tatiana how she was, and she’d burst into tears. Undoubtedly, she'd been hiding herself away, and the sudden interruption simply set her off. It wasn’t like Alm _had_ to rush forward to comfort her; he could easily have apologized for intruding, grabbed the knife, and gone back to his peach. Instead, alarmed at the lack of a sunny smile, he’d hugged her instead.

“He’s not going to leave,” Alm insists. “Zeke loves you.”

She cries, horribly, and he honestly feels like his heart is breaking. Her entire body is wracked with sobs, and she feels smaller, more vulnerable, instead of the bright, shining beacon of light that helps guide him through his difficulties. He hopes no one comes in, because he knows that she would be mortified if anyone so much as thought she was showing such weakness.

But, as Alm rests a hand on her head, he sees that he never before realized how _small_ Tatiana actually is.

“But he’s remembering,” she protests, and she sobs again into his shoulder. “He has to go home when he remembers.”

“That’s not true,” he assures, but he does wonder: If Zeke remembers a family, or anything similar to that, from back where he came from, would he leave to go back to them? He knows that his general is remembering bits and pieces, more and more after every fight, and he wonders how it will affect his relationship with Tatiana.

“Alm, I’m selfish,” she admits. “I don’t want him to remember! I want him to stay here, with me, and love _me.”_

“That’s not selfish!”

Her arms squeeze tighter around him, and he swallows as she bursts into a fresh bout of tears. There’s nothing he can do or say that will console her, because he’s not Zeke, and because of that, he can’t give her straight, truthful answers. He can’t talk through this in place of him, even though he wishes he could; he can’t stand to see Tatiana with red, puffy eyes, or feel her trembling arms, or see her so heartbroken.

Alm knows that if Zeke has the gall to leave her, though, he’ll do his best to care for her in his place.

* * *

Rigel Castle is only another week’s march away, but things are surprisingly calm. The cold is worse than ever, but despite that, people are in high spirits, have good amounts of energy, and morale is high. Alm spends every second of his day checking his platoons, checking weapon stock, and especially ensuring that all their healers are well equipped.

He goes looking for Tatiana on a warmer day, intending to hand over some reports on their medicine supplies, and to ask if her staff needs any repairs or touch-ups before their final march. He finds her with Forsyth in the laundry area, laughing together as they scrub clothes in the lukewarm water.

“Oh, there you are.” Alm walks up behind them, and she and Forsyth stop giggling over whatever it was they were talking about.

“Hello!” she says cheerily. “What do you need, honey?”

Alm has no idea what sort of embarrassment he’s about to bring to himself.

Mindlessly, while searching through other papers and reading the statistics, he hands her the proper reports. “Can you look over these and then talk with Silque about them? Our healers are going to be crucial in this last fight, so you guys gotta be prepared.”

Tatiana reads over the paper, holding it gingerly in her soapy hands. “Will do. Anything else?”

“Does your staff need repairs?” he asks, once more absentmindedly. He’s too busy staring at all the zeroes on a bill from a blacksmith to really focus on what he’s asking.

“Nope, it’s in perfect condition. I take good care of it.” Tatiana sets the report aside and scrubs a coat up and down on a washboard. “What else? You better get going if you don’t have anything so Forsyth and I can finish the laundry.”

“That’s all. Thanks, Mom.”

Forsyth and Tatiana’s delighted chattering goes quiet, and Alm doesn’t know why. Finally snapped back to his surroundings, he looks up from the paper, then down at them with confusion. “What?”

Tatiana’s lips are twitching up into a smile, and Forsyth appears embarrassed as he explains, “You just referred to Miss Tatiana as ‘Mom.’”

His face immediately goes red, and he throws his hands down at his sides. “No, I didn’t.”

“Alm, it’s okay,” she reassures, but her voice quavers as she holds back a laugh. “I’m flattered, really, that you see me like that.”

His entire body is burning now. “I don’t!”

“You called her ‘Mom,’” Forsyth repeats, and he appears to be growing steadily more amused. “I suppose she does tend to dote on everyone in camp, so it’s not surprising you might accidentally call her such, but-”

“I didn’t call her my mom!” he protests, his voice rising.

“It’s okay,” Tatiana says again, and she busies herself with the laundry to avoid looking at him.

“You’re not my mom!” Alm nearly shrieks, and he dies as Tatiana then bursts into laughter, releasing her laundry and hunching over on the ground, her entire body shaking as she giggles. “I didn’t call you ‘Mom!’”

Forsyth is laughing now, too, and between it all, he chokes out, “Be nice to your mother!”

“I’m flattered,” Tatiana says as she laughs, and she holds her stomach as she hunches over again. “Really, I am!”

“Shut up!” Alm snaps, and she laughs even harder.

Forsyth snaps into seriousness for a moment, but there’s still mirth in his eyes. “Show your mother proper respect,” he says, but he falls back into hysterics before the end of his sentence, collapsing against the ground.

Alm’s face is burning, his entire body is shaking, and he grips his remaining reports and storms away. “I’m going back now!”

Finally, their laughter fades, as Alm stalks back into the main camp. He passes by Zeke, who pauses to greet him.

“Alm,” he says politely.

“Tatiana is _not_ my mom, and you tell her that!” Alm snaps back.

Zeke stares after him as he rushes into his tent. “Oh. Very well.”

Alm does the rest of his work in his tent for the rest of the day, and when Tatiana brings him tea in the middle of the night with a sunny smile and a pat on his head, he relents to admit—only to himself!—that maybe, just maybe, Tatiana is kind of, sort of, maybe a motherly-figure to him.

But he’s not going to call her “Mom” ever again.


End file.
